OMM2018 - Night 2: Halloween (1978)

 

Night 2: Halloween (1978)

 

Quality: 4/5 - Larry thought this movie was better than I did. It may have been the site we were watching, but the sound mixing was off (music very loud, dialogue soft) and I couldn't tell if it was a poor quality rip or weird unfocusing for effect. Solid directing, even if some shots were confusing in terms of POV.

 

Enjoyableness: 3/5 - dialogue was clunky, a few good scares, but nothing great. Maybe it's because of it's age but the beats were pretty obvious, especially after the 2nd fakeout (spoilers?)

Spookiness: Spooky! - it's a solid scary movie. You won't nessecarily keep thinking about it afterwards- but I had to turn the lights on after it was done. For all of it's corniness there is some true horror in it.

 

 

OMM2018 - Night 1: Frankenstein (1931)

 From my #OctoberMovieMarathon in 2018.

Frankenstein (1931) (Night 1)

 

Quality: 4/5 - a few "old movie" issues (scoring, transitions, sound mixing) but a very solidly directed movie. And Boris Karlof's performance was excellent.

 

Enjoyableness: 3/5 - it's a classic and worth a watch if you've never seen it before. But I won't be requesting to rewatch it. Young Frankenstein does so many callbacks and homages to this movie I never understood before!

 

Spookiness: PSpoopy - (Pretty spooky, but no lasting unease)

 

 

October Movie Marathon List (2018)

After consulting friends on Facebook, we made a list for Laura and Larry's #OctoberMovieMarathon 2018! (or #OMM2018)

 

The Requirements were:

1. Must be a movie enhanced by being watched in the dark/at night

2. At least 1 of us hasn't seen the movie.

And thanks for all the suggestions!

 

 

Legend of Zelda, and I why I will forever be angry at it

I was never a big gamer as a child.  All we had at my house was a Nintendo 64 and 4 games: Pokemon Snap, Super Mario 64, Star Fox 64, and Mario Kart.  I was terrible at these games, but my older brother was amazing at them.  Some of my favorite memories are sitting on the back of the couch watching my brother play, to me it was like a movie starring my brother.  Though I will always claim victory in discovering the XYZ portals in Star Fox because I did it first. (we thought I had glitched the game at first, but no I had just found something unknown!)

I wanted to be cool like my brother, and he liked video games and was good at them.  However, I couldn't get past the first Bowser in Mario 64, and found the later levels too difficult.  To this day I've never beaten the game.  I tried playing my brother's Pokemon games on his gameboy, as they seemed a bit easier, but I was never allowed to save so I wouldn't mess up his file.  So it wasn't until I was older that I got games of my own.

My first game was Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.  I got it for my birthday after my family got a Wii for Christmas.  My mother had grabbed it, thinking that I would enjoy the "story-driven action" and the fact that it stars a girl.  (Zelda, who was assumedly, the Twilight Princess).  I knew practically nothing about the LoZ franchise- except that it featured a Zelda and a Link from Super Smash Bros.  But who was who and why was a mystery to me.

I loved the game when I started it.  I was this mysterious kid living by myself, with whispers around the village that the princess of the land was missing and no one knew what she looked like.  But they knew she was a different race than they (or had the look of being royal or something).  And I'm this kid who doesn't look like anyone else and no one knows where I came from.... obviously I had to be the missing princess!  Obvious twist, but fun (I thought).  When my gal-pal gave me back my horse I was excited to learn that they had two females being friends, or possibly more than friends ooh-la-la how fantastic!  I fought my way through the first temple, witnessed my BFF getting kidnapped and got turned into a wolf.  Now I have been thrust into the epic quest.  Eventually I get enough tears of light (or something) and change back into my human form.  And what do I see on my secret princess Zelda?

It's the freaking green guy my brother always plays as in Smash Brothers.  The jerk that shouts nonsense and kills me instantly.

What?  I was stunned.  And saddened, because now my awesome alter ego gal and her BFF and the strange mini-lady from another world was for sure- a dude.  I was heartbroken.  I wanted to play as a girl.  I got to choose my own name, and I looked pretty gender neutral- why couldn't I be a girl?

Through the rest of the game I was repeatedly reminded that I was, in fact, a man.  Or a boy claiming his identity as "hero" and "manly" and such.  Then lo and behold, the princess I thought I might have been is actually hiding (trapped?) in the tower and I have to save her.  Fantastic.  Also the mini-lady is another princess who I have to save because in the end she needs me to finish stuff off.

You might call me out by saying that "Legend of Zelda" is actually about Link and "HE'S the main character its' your fault for not knowing the legacy of the game".  Well, I'd have to disagree.  Most of the time, if the title is a name, it's the main character.  Mario, Donkey Kong, Mega Man, Sonic- they're all the main characters.  Even the games that I owned had the basic premise and characters in the title.  Star Fox was about the Star Fox team, Super Mario and Mario Kart were about Mario either being super or driving a Kart.  Pokemon Snap is all about snapping pictures of Pokemon.  The titles are very indicative of what's inside the game.  When my mother found LoZ: Twilight Princess she assumed it would be a game about Zelda who is a Twilight Princess (and also wolf from the artwork apparently.  That's the whole reason I was given this game.  I didn't go out and get it.  My mother asked me what games I would like to play so our Wii could be used, and I asked for a story-driven game as opposed to a shooter game or a fighting game.

But how sad is it that in my mother's attempt to find a "story-driven" game for her somewhat dark teenage daughter ends up in a game where the title female is basically unimportant.  I don't even remember what Zelda did in the game.  That's less memory than Peach's role in a game I never even finished.  That doesn't bode well for the storytelling and character departments.

Perhaps I'm being too harsh, after all, anyone who knew LoZ would automatically assume that it would star Link (because when has Zelda done anything in any of "her" games).  But to a girl who wasn't that into video games, but very much wanted to be because so many cool people liked video games- it was depressing to learn that there weren't any games starring females.  All I wanted was a game that either starred a female overtly, or had a gender neutral main character that could be whoever the player was.  In fact, if the game had removed the multiple comments from other characters about my needing to be "more manly" "man up" "be the man" or "become a man" I could have easily gone through the game forcing my newly discovered Link character to actually be me on a grand adventure.  I could have imagined that my clearly female name matched the character onscreen instead of being a false name for the "man" actually doing the work.

Though I have a deep fear that it'll never happen, I wish there was a Legend of Zelda game that starred Zelda.  It could be the exact same as any LoZ game, except instead of Link, it  could be Zelda fighting the big bad and saving Link from certain disaster.  But if the already established franchise can't find it in their pockets to pay for a game starring their girl character perhaps there's another game company that would prefer to make a game.

I'm tired of playing games that star men, games that only feature girls as the things to be saved, or worse- competent characters that end up needing to be saved because they couldn't defend themselves after all.  I remember hearing about Mass Effect 3, which featured 2 storylines that were identical except that Captain Shepard was a girl in the other game.  There was even another box art that featured the female Shepard on the back of the original.  But apparently when the game was being sold in stores it only showed the "default" male Shepard on the cover art as that was what the company decided should be facing out.  You would hope they would at least split it 50/50 so that they get any on-the-fence female gamers to give the game a chance because it starred a female.

I do like video games, and my SO says I'm quite good at them.  I've finally gotten a Steam account and got a few different games to play, as well as an emulator to play some more classic games.  I actually finished Majora's Mask and Ocarina of Time from LoZ a few months ago.  So I can better appreciate the aspect of playing as Link.

But there will always be that disappointed teenaged girl who wanted to save the land of Hyrule only to learn that in order to do so, she had to turn into a boy so he could grow into a man and save the day.  My mother wanted to give me a game starring someone like me, a strong heroine.  Instead, it starred someone like my brother- who again, I got to look up to but not become while watching in the background.  As for the girl who started the quest, she was basically just the kid reading the book, who had no impact on the character at all.

And I'll never forgive Legend of Zelda for that.

Posting too Much?

Lately I've become pretty active on Facebook.  It's my personal page, and when I browse Facebook, I tend to look at pictures from pages I like.  This then leads to my liking a bunch of pictures and sharing others.

This is where the problem lies.  I end up sharing posting too much.

Today my statues/shares totaled 31.  I'm not sure how that compares to other people, but according to my friends on Facebook I AM THE NEWSFEED.  So I guess I'm at least flooding that.  But it brings up a question:

How much is "Too Much" posting?

Before I begin dissecting my own actions, let me first explore my personal Rules of the Internet.  There's a couple rules that I believe you should abide by when posting on the internet.  (I'm only going to post a few here that are somewhat relevant. Maybe next blog I'll do a full one about all my rules...)

1. TMI - Too Much Information.  Pretty self explanatory. A good way to check this is to ask yourself one question: "If someone else was telling me the same thing- would I feel awkward?"  It's that status about how you feel sick, which goes into detail about exactly which part of you hurts, how, why, and the amount of vomit you've spewed compared to the diarrhea that's come out.  See?  You already feel awkward.  Keep that $#%* to yourself.
2. Memes and Reposting - This rule is something that happens mostly on sites like Reddit, Tumblr, or Imgur where people post many pictures or memes.  I'm sure you've already seen this, when people keep posting that same joke, that same picture, over and over and over.  It's funny once.  Maybe twice.  Not so much later.  On Facebook, the biggest culprit is memes. It's not terrible, but it's annoying.  Surely there's something else out there that's just as funny that we haven't already seen!  And these pictures aren't being posted to raise awareness, they're just funny.  The flip side of this problem is when people post other pictures or words without giving credit to the original creator.
3. Swearing - I don't like swearing. So I try not to use anything that would be censored on a PG movie.  However, I recognize that there are others who don't mind swearing. So I don't hold others to this rule unless every &$*#%( other &*#$%*+{? word is a $(#%+\#@!^ swear.  Don't go overboard.  There are kids on the internet.  As adults we should be able to recognize it.
4. Act Your Age in Real Life - Basically, if you're 20 something- you should act and behave like you are that age and the same as if you were real life.  There's that feeling on the internet where people think they can just do whatever they want without penalties.  But you are a person who can control your own actions, so you should.

My first thought is that I'm mostly sharing pictures.  It's not personal statuses, so I'm not crossing the TMI boundary.  And I'm not simply reposting silly pictures.  Most of the pictures I share come from Feminist pages, and have something to do with that movement and link right back to the page I got them from.  So that takes out.  There's not a lot of swearing in the posts... and they are valid discussions on the topic.  So what's the problem?

Rule #5.

You don't see a Rule #5 on my list?  That's because I don't have one.  But others seem to. But only on Facebook.

5.  Unless you're a page - don't post so much.

I've... never gotten that rule.  I still don't.  Part of the backlash I've received has something to do with the stuff I'm posting.  Either it's not funny, or not interesting, or not what they want to see.  But I have hundreds of friends.  I'm not on Facebook for 1 or 2.  In fact, my Facebook is mostly for me.  So when I'm posting stuff, I'm really just posting because I'm enjoying it.  It's like that tumblr you had where no one followed you, but you reblogged stuff anyways because you liked it?  It's that.

Except it's Facebook and I guess that's different.

So I'm not sure what to do about that...

What are your own guidelines for the internet?

-PimLp

I'm finally back HOME!

It's been a long summer since I last posted.  The semester ended and I landed my first big girl job!

This summer I got to be a camp counselor, and it was awesome!  Tiring, and I have no internet whatsoever... but it was fun.  I made fire, hiked around, rode horses and played in boats all summer.

I just wish I had been able to vlog more.  I barely made 3 minutes a day. 5 minutes on a super good day.  But I can't vlog the children so I had to work around it.  Oh well, at least I did something!

But now the summer is over, and I'm back home at SBU.  WOO!  We had our first football game/marching band performance yesterday.  We won. At both. :D  And I finally settled my room.  Well, almost, I still have a few school things that need to find a home.  However, overall my room is FANTASTIC!  The layout is awesome, I have my own cave thing with my desk and bed, and I even brought my own sewing machine.

That's right.  A sewing machine!

Over the summer I made 2 swimmable mermaid tails with my mother's machine.  And now, I'm free to create everything else I want... some more tails, maybe a quilt.

I've been wanting to make a big quilt out of all my old tshirts form high school.  I've already cut out all the sections that I want, so with luck I'll be able to figure out how to actually sew them together.

From what I can figure out, to make one, you just need to cut out the parts of the tshirts you want with enough edge around them for a hem (about a 1/4") and then piece them together.  Any extra fabric you need to even out the square or fill in space can double as your backing color.

So this semester, I'm going to try to utilize this blog as a "how-to" of sorts for all my projects.

To start with, a basic guide for swimmable mermaid tails.  You need a patter of you from about your belly button to your feet.  For the fin itself you need to have a mono fin.  So put it on and lay down, draw around your body and your fin.  Then cut out your pattern.

Once you have your pattern, you can pick out fabric.  You'll want fabric that won't weigh you down too much in the water.   The best would be swimming fabric (you can find it in most fabric stores if you look).  Then plan out how you're going to get your fin in and out.  I opted for a zipper on the bottom of the fin, so it can get in and out without stretching out the ankle area.  You can also use ribbon ties, or push it in from the opening at the top.

I use elastic for the top of the tail around the waist.

Basically, get your fin and think through how you want to remove it.  If you'd rather keep the fin in at all times, then just sew your fin inside the tail.  Look around online for swimmable mermaid tails to see different ways people have done it.

Until the next update!  I'll see you later!

-Pim

I feel like a failure. :(

Today was the finals for the SBU Idol singing competition.  I auditioned and made it all the way into the top 8.  And then we all performed.  Everyone was great!  And then I went up to sing.

I didn't do well.

The moment I hit the last note I knew I was terrible.  I didn't have enough air or the right support and the back of my throat was feeling fuzzy and crackling.  But I ended well and people were cheering and I felt like I had done really well.  That's when the announcer asked the judges what they thought.  Now, the judges hadn't given critiques on everyone, but I thought I would get rave reviews.  Instead they mentioned how I should have chosen a song more in my range and not be so pitchy.  As soon as I heard that I knew there was no way I was doing well in the competition.

And lo and behold I didn't place.  (They only announced the top 3.)

But the worst part about it is how people were reacting afterwards.  Everyone told me I was great, some people gave me advice on how I could have been better.  Honestly, I would have preferred people give me sympathy for not winning.  I did well yes, but it was the finals, everyone "did well".  And since I just lost, I wish I could have gotten advice on being better later.

I've been fighting tears ever since.

Don't get me wrong, I am so happy to have been able to even compete in the finals, and the people who won were amazing!  But that doesn't mean I didn't want to win.  I feel crushed.  I wasn't good enough and I don't know why.  And I may never know.  And I feel sad that I didn't do better.

I wanted to win, or at least dazzle the crowd.  Instead right after my performance I got to hear about how bad I was.  And by the end, it turns out I was somewhere between "the worst performer there" and "just missing the cut".  From my viewpoint, since I'm not singled out as good- I must be bad.

And that hurts.